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7 Ways to Go Green in Everyday Life

With the billions of people living in the world today we don’t quite realize how huge of an impact we leave on our environment from a day-to-day basis. If everyone were to do a little bit here and there to keep their areas clean and learn to waste a little less we would make a tremendous impact on the Earth’s well-being. “Going Green” doesn’t need to be a life changing method. There are hundreds of tiny ways you can help save the planet. Not only will you feel good about helping, but most of these helpful things will save you money in the long run. It is an over-all win-win solution, what’s not to love about that?

Here are 7 ways to go green in every-day life that you can do to help save the planet:

1. Turn off the Water While Brushing: You would be surprised how much water is wasted by leaving the water on when you are not using it. By turning the water off you will save about 5 gallons per day. If everyone in the U.S stopped we could save up to 1.5 billion gallons per day.

2. Telecommute or Cruise Control: Arrange to work from home even if it is only a day or two out of the week. You will save big on gas and get to work in your pajamas. If this is not do-able for you then use cruise control on your way to work. You could get up to 15% better mileage and save money at the pump all while relieving the planet of a little less pollution each day.

3. Use Both Sides of the Paper: In the US alone, businesses throw out 21 million tons of paper each year. That’s 175 pounds for each office worker. Imagine what impact we would have if everyone switched to double-sided printing.

4. Pay Bills Online: If every household in the US switched to electronic payments and paperless billing we could save 18.5 million trees each year, 2.2 billion tons of carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases, and 1.7 billion pounds of waste. You could even set up an automatic payment system so that you don’t have to lift a finger to ensure that your bills get paid on-time.

5. Use a Reusable Cup for Water or Coffee: Switching to a reusable cup or bottle will not only save you money every day and keep your coffee hot or give you a healthier option of plastic such as “BPA free” containers but it would enormously limit the amount of waste going into the landfill every day. Currently, 90% of the recycle-able water bottles are not being recycled. Instead, they are filling up our landfills taking thousands of years to decompose.

6. Wash Clothes on Warm-Cold Cycle: Not only will your clothes look better but if every household in the US switched to a cooler cycle, we could save the energy equivalent to 100,000 barrels of oil per day.

7. Turn off Computers at Night: Turning off your computer at night will save you 40 watt-hours per day, 4 cents per day, or $14 per year.

We know what you are thinking, “I can’t make that big of an impact”. Even if you don’t think you are making an impact on the planet, you will make in impact on your own life. If we all just paid a little more attention to the little things and made a smarter decision for ourselves to go green we really could help restore our home to its natural beauty. If you want to know more about what you can do to help the planet and go green call Chicago Gateway Green Today. Where we are dedicated to Greening and Beautifying Chicago’s Expressway, Gateways, and Neighborhoods.